Congratulations Katherine Fordon, the winner of our 2018 Emerging Executive of the Year award. We will be honoring Katherine (and our other winners) at our annual Make Your Mark Awards on Thursday, Nov 15 at the Santa Clara Marriott. RSVP to celebrate with us!

Katherine Fordon is a Bay Area communications professional with 16 years of experience helping companies market and communicate their messages to their employees and the world. After earning a Bachelor of Science degree in journalism from the University of Colorado in Boulder, Colorado, Katherine went on to work as a sports writer for the Longmont Times-Call (formerly known as the Daily Times-Call). A move to Chicago led Katherine into the field of public relations where she worked on the world-famous “got milk?” mobile marketing tour and represented well-known companies and organizations, such as Turtle Wax, Rubbermaid, GLAD, USG, John G. Shedd Aquarium and the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA), as well as Fortune 500 clients, including Whirlpool Corporation and Skil Power Tools (Robert Bosch GmbH). After agency life, Katherine spent almost a decade running her own communications consulting business, Katherine Fordon Public Relations (KFPR), helping Bay Area companies and agencies with their communications needs. Katherine is currently the Director of Corporate Communications for Wilbur-Ellis, a San Francisco-based company. Passionate about women’s rights and equality, Katherine is a board member of Women of Wilbur-Ellis, the Company’s first business resource group, a member of Watermark’s Emerging Executive Advisory Council and a volunteer for Courageous Women Association’s Career Development and Economic Empowerment Program. Katherine also serves as a board member for Diablo Valley Montessori School. When she’s not working, Katherine enjoys spending time with her husband and two children exploring all the wonderful food, music, culture and nature in the Bay Area and beyond.

Most Valuable Lesson

It’s a pretty basic and fundamental lesson, but more important than ever in our digital world: Never burn a bridge. Everything comes back to haunt you, good or bad.

Advice for 20-Year-Old Self

Stop. Breathe. And know that this is just a moment, is a small space in time where work or life – or both – are crazy. Life is constantly going to throw you curve balls and the innings never end. Just take them one at a time and lean into those pitches, don’t step out of the batter’s box.

Smartest Career Move

Walking away from running my own consulting business to go back inhouse with a single company. I was leaving behind freedom to choose my clients, choose the people I would work with, set my pay and decide my own hours. However, what I gained was so much more. I gained a team that is focused on a single goal. I gained exposure to markets and industries that I never would have in my own consulting business. I gained a boss who not only cares about my career, but cares about my family and my life outside of work as well.

Secret Ingredient for Growth and Success

Being myself. For so long, I tried to fit inside these personalities that I thought my manager or supervisor wanted in the role. Only when I truly was myself did I start to see growth and change. That growth and change, leads to success.

Congratulations Ana Pinczuk, the winner of our 2018 Development award. We will be honoring Ana (and our other winners) at our annual Make Your Mark Awards on Thursday, Nov 15 at the Santa Clara Marriott. RSVP to celebrate with us!

Ana Pinczuki was President and General Manager for HPE Pointnext, HPE’s $7B+ services business until August 2018. She led a team of 25,000 IT experts responsible for driving customer’s digital transformation journeys including Hybrid IT and Intelligent edge consulting, professional and operational services. Previously, Ana was the Chief Product Officer at Veritas where she was responsible for driving a $2.5B products organization, including the Veritas Information Availability, Information Management, Backup and Recovery and Appliances portfolios. Prior to joining Veritas, Ana spent 15 years at Cisco where she held various roles including SVP, Global Services Sales, Services COO and SVP, Global Services Support. Ana also spent nine years in the Cisco Development Organization driving Engineering groups, including Cisco’s high-end routing platform and IOS product management and software development. Ana started her career at AT&T Bell Laboratories as a systems engineer and held numerous roles there, including Vice President responsible for deploying AT&T’s Internet backbone. Ana is a member of the International Women’s Forum, Anita Borg Institute, Cornell Computer and Information Sciences Advisory Board, and Carnegie Mellon Engineering Advisory Board. She is also the recipient of numerous awards including Fortune’s 2018 and 2017 Top 50 Latinas, 2016 Women of Influence Award, 2017 and 2016 HITEC 100, 2014 Corporate Index (Top 25 Hispanics), 2013 Latina Style Executive of the Year, and 2013 TWIN Award. Ana holds a Bachelor of Science and Master of Engineering degree in Mechanical Engineering from Cornell University, a Master of Technology Management degree from the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School, and a Master of Science Degree in Software Management from Carnegie Mellon University.

Smartest Career Move

I've reinvented myself several times, whether it's going from an engineering centric role to business development or sales, shifting technologies, size of companies, geographic location, etc. One of the smartest career moves I made was when I moved from AT&T to Cisco. Looking back, it was a crazy decision. I was 7.5 months pregnant, had spent 15 years at AT&T on the East Coast, was a Vice President with a thriving career. I moved with a 2 year old and newborn to California, took a demotion to a Senior Director into a position that was very new at the company, and had to restart at a new company. Yet it was the best decision ever! I learned a new market, was a small fish in a bigger pond (very grounding experience), had to prove myself once again, and learned to make choices to balance personal and professional goals. Most of all, I learned to trust my instincts and to be agile in new situations. It has served me well throughout my career.

Favorite Mentor (and Mentee)

My favorite mentor is my husband. He is very grounded and gives me the best advice (even when I want to ignore it). I am an extroverted person that is always multitasking in many areas of my life - work, kids, parents, community, for profit or non-profit boards, etc. He's helped me think beyond a career path but truly how to think about success, with career being just one part of that.

I have so many mentees that I've enjoyed mentoring. I've had one mentee at Cisco that has progressed from individual contributor to an executive. I was not easy with my advice to him but I was very honest. He listened, took it in, and has really grown as a leader. He's taught me how to be a better listener and work with feedback to improve oneself. I had one mentee at HPE who was also a reverse mentor. I was able to give her advice about what to do in her role as a new services seller, and she helped me immensely with feedback from the ground - truly what was going on in the field.

Personal Hero

My mom is my personal hero. She got her PhD in the 60s in Biology at a time when there were few women (specially married women with a child) pursuing PhDs. She has an amazing disposition, has been a wonderful mom, wife and role model, and is still a professor at almost 80! I aim to be as great a human as she is.

Congratulations Brandi Galvin Morandi, the winner of our 2018 Connection award. We will be honoring Brandi (and our other winners) at our annual Make Your Mark Awards on Thursday, Nov 15 at the Santa Clara Marriott. RSVP to celebrate with us!

Brandi Galvin Morandi is the Chief Legal Officer and Corporate Secretary of Equinix, the global interconnection and data center company. Brandi leads a global organization, responsible for legal and regulatory compliance matters, governmental affairs and corporate governance, including working closely with the Equinix Board of Directors. Under her leadership, her organization has grown to support a business generating over $5 billion in revenues annually. Brandi has led the successful consummation of numerous acquisitions and joint ventures nationally and internationally and has also led the internal and external legal teams to complete over $27 billion in equity and debt financings.

When Brandi co-founded the Equinix Woman’s Leadership Network 10 years ago, her goal was not to separate women from men, but to help elevate them towards equality. This is why her Connection Award is so fitting as this year, the EWLN further branched into the leadership space across the world to bring leaders together to take immediate action in removing gender bias. Through practicing inclusion and driving action through top leaders, the discussion and awareness about where the opportunities for Equinix exist has become a top priority for our incoming CEO.

Secret Ingredient to Success

Empowerment for all employees, by creating an environment where every individual is given the opportunity to bring their best to work. This is facilitated by identifying and removing barriers for my team, by giving everyone a voice, and thinking through representation and opportunity across my diverse global team. In addition to this, I also believes that taking people with you on a journey makes you more successful. Once you find yourself gaining traction and being recognized for your contributions and success, look around and figure out who you can bring with you.

Advice for 20-Year-Old Self

Recognize the power of your own voice earlier. Everyone brings a unique set of skills, experiences, and backgrounds to the table and the unique assets are the biggest contribution to a company. In finding your own voice, also have confidence in yourself and take risks. Raising your hand and trying new things is not always easy, but the more you do it, the easier it feels to try something new.

Personal Hero

My personal hero is Ruth Bader Ginsburg who said, “Fight for the things that you care about, but do it in a way that will lead others to join you”. RBG inspired me through her methodical approach and looking at the long view. She strategically chipped away at equality over decades, and used her voice to create an easier path for those behind her.

Congratulations René Shimada Siegel, the winner of our 2018 Advocacy award. We will be honoring Women Who Code (and our other winners) at our annual Make Your Mark Awards on Thursday, Nov 15 at the Santa Clara Marriott. RSVP to celebrate with us!

René Shimada Siegel is extremely passionate about empowering colleagues and advocating for the next generation of communicators. She is the founder and CEO of Connext, Silicon Valley’s marketing and communications consultancy. For two decades, her company has made life easier for hundreds of technology clients with specialized consultants ranging from recent grads to senior strategists. René also passes on her real-world experience to students as a public relations professor at San Jose State University and is a frequent speaker on entrepreneurship, career strategies, and personal branding. She currently serves on the Dean’s Advisory Board for the Lucas College of Business at San Jose State University, and will be a featured speaker at the 2018 Public Relations Society of America International Conference. As an entrepreneur, René’s been featured in Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, Working Mother, Newsweek Japan, CNBC, and Dan Pink’s Free Agent Nation, among others. She’s also been a regular columnist for Inc.com.

Smartest Career Move

Rebranding our 20 year old company last year was risky as hell. Will the team follow? Will our clients get it? Is this really the right direction? YES! We’ve elevated our brand, separated ourselves from our competitors, and changed more lives along the way. We now live in this amazingly cool space that is the convergence of The Gig Economy and Generations XYZ. And it’s a ton of fun!

Admired Mentor or Muse

My daughter Arielle is my mentor. Her impending birth was the catalyst for leaving my corporate job to build the life I wanted for my family. While in college, she was a catalyst to help us see the gap between college students and recent graduates, and the Silicon Valley corporate teams that need them. Now, we bridge that gap. She continually pushes me outside my comfort zone and inspires me with confidence. Her advice and opinions are unfiltered, on point, and the smack-in-the-face that I need sometimes to stay current and not become a dinosaur.

Quotes to Live By

Best Work. Best Life. Everyone deserves both.

Personal Heros

My hero is Dominic Prado for three reasons. What he does, the way he does it, and the way he lives his life. Dom joined us as a summer marketing intern and became our entire marketing department. As a business leader I have purpose and passion but struggled to articulate a powerful vision and voice. My hero riffed with me, challenged me, nudged me forward with quiet strength and fearless instincts. With no prior experience, he rebranded our entire company with a new name, logo, website, social media. But then he did so much more. He’s made my vision come to life in ways I never expected. Dom has overcome unexpected challenges with such grace. Because of him, I look at the world in a totally different way. It’s all about what is possible.

Congratulations Rami Elghandour, the winner of our 2018 Bill Campbell award. We will be honoring Women Who Code (and our other winners) at our annual Make Your Mark Awards on Thursday, Nov 15 at the Santa Clara Marriott. RSVP to celebrate with us!

Rami Elghandour joined Nevro in 2012, has served as Nevro’s Chief Business Officer, and currently serves as President and CEO of the company. Prior to joining Nevro, Rami was an investor with Johnson & Johnson Development Corporation (JJDC), where he led several investments including Nevro Series B Financing. During his tenure, Rami served on the Board of Directors of several private companies, including Nevro’s, and led strategic initiatives in the development and management of JJDC’s portfolio. Prior to joining JJDC, Rami worked for Advanced Neuromodulation Systems, Inc. (acquired by St. Jude Medical, Inc.), where he led firmware design and development on several implantable spinal cord stimulators. Rami received a MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and holds a BS in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Rutgers University School of Engineering.

Secret Ingredient for Growth and Success

My secret ingredient for growth and success has been building exceptional teams. At the heart of doing that is creating a culture where everybody matters and where diversity and inclusion are part of the organizational fabric. With women representing over half of the managers at Nevro and one third of the Management team, our exceptional team is reliant on having the best talent and that is reflected in its diversity.
What’s your favorite quote, saying or personal mantra?

Quotes to Live By

My favorite quote is “my mother always told me If you are a soldier, you will become a general. If you are a monk, you will become the Pope. Instead, I was a painter, and became Picasso.’ This quote is very reminiscent of how my mother, who is an incredibly brave and independent woman, set my expectations. She taught me to believe in myself in the same way that Watermark inspires women to believe in their potential and aspire to greater heights. That mission certainly inspired me and I’ve sincerely enjoyed partnering with Watermark to contribute towards fulfilling it.

Congratulations Women Who Code, the winner of our 2018 Impact award. We will be honoring Women Who Code (and our other winners) at our annual Make Your Mark Awards on Thursday, Nov 15 at the Santa Clara Marriott. RSVP to celebrate with us!

Women Who Code (WWCode) is an international nonprofit dedicated to inspiring women to excel in technology careers. WWCode is building a world where women are proportionally representative as technical leaders, executives, founders, VCs, board members and software engineers. The organization has executed more than 7,000 free technical events around the world, garnered a membership exceeding 137,000, and has a presence in 20 countries. Help empower even more women to advance in tech with the training and community they need to succeed by supporting WWCode. Learn more at womenwhocode.com.

Alaina Percival is Chief Executive Officer of Women Who Code, a global nonprofit dedicated to inspiring women to excel in technology careers. Under Alaina’s leadership, Women Who Code has grown to serve more than 137,000 women in 20 countries and 60 cities across the globe. This thriving movement offers more than 1,700 free technical and leadership events, per year. In addition to her role at Women Who Code, Percival is an accomplished tech speaker, appearing at WSJ.d Live, CodeMotion Milan, Grace Hopper, Columbia University’s Social Enterprise, MIT’s Venture Capital and Innovation Conference and more. Alaina has been interviewed by Forbes, Wall Street Journal, Wired, and other publications across the globe to share her expertise on best practices for increasing diversity in tech. Prior to Women Who Code, Alaina worked at PUMA's headquarters in Germany, as well as Riviera Partners and Snip.it, acquired by Yahoo. Alaina is also an Angel Investor and CodePath Advisor.

Secret Ingredient for Growth and Success

Grit combined with focus. It’s the willingness to do absolutely everything in a company, from marketing and design to compliance and taxes, and also find experts you can pass it on to. It’s also really important to never give up, because things aren't always successful, and you have to constantly face the risk of failure if you want to eventually succeed.

Impact from Mentorship

I am so incredibly proud of the work we are doing in this area at Women Who Code. The Global Leadership program we have developed scales mentoring, with Directors empowering members to take on Leadership roles in our Networks, and them empowering other members to become Leaders in a constant cycle of success. That’s important because being a WWCode Leader opens them up to new opportunities to speak at conferences, and mentor others, and that allows them to level up and become leaders in their local tech community quickly, often within a year of taking part in the program.

Quotes to Live By

“Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go.” - TS Eliot

Personal Heros

Personally, my mom is my hero, for too many reasons to list. But professionally, it’s Richard Branson, because he’s able to be humble despite all of his achievements. He’s able to build global organizations that are all connected through the Brand DNA that is Virgin, and still, have a wanderlust and a sense of adventure that is really incredible in this world. I also really admire that he believes in giving back to the community.

Congratulations Amee Cooper, the winner of our 2018 Senior Executive of the Year award. We will be honoring Amee (and our other winners) at our annual Make Your Mark Awards on Thursday, Nov 15 at the Santa Clara Marriott. RSVP to celebrate with us!

Amee Cooper is the Senior Director, R&D Operations at VMware, Inc. She joined VMware in 2006 as the Manager of Partner Infrastructure and rose through the ranks to her current roles as the Chief of Staff of R&D Operations and Central Services and as the co-Chief of Staff to the two COOs of R&D Product and Cloud Services within VMware. She also leads organizations delivering R&D Technical Education and cross-R&D programs.

Amee started her career as an Accountant for Samson Companies before deciding her passion for people and computers came before her love of numbers. She transitioned to work on business systems and applications for the global companies Lexmark and InterGen. At VMware, Amee envisioned and created the Change Management practice, delivering best practice activities on global corporate initiatives. She now utilizes her Project Management and Change Management skills to lead and deliver impactful programs for R&D within VMware.

For the inaugural year of the Women@VMware Power of Difference Community, Amee served as the co-Lead for the global employee resource group. She was also a contributor to the VMware Foundation’s two papers on Transforming Technology Pro Bono. Amee earned dual bachelor’s degrees in Accounting and Business Computer Information Systems from John Brown University.

Smartest Career Move

My latest career move was the smartest move to date as I moved from leading a Project Management and Change Management organization to being a central engineering operations leader / Chief of Staff. It was such a thrill to take on something new and feel confident I could continue to deliver value to VMware, even while learning tons more for a company I thought I knew well. One lesson I learned during this process was to make a few lists. One of those lists was a list of my strengths / skills so that when I came up against a seemingly insurmountable deliverable, I was able to look at my list of strengths / skills and find the courage to press forward and conquer. It helped increase my confidence in a time of uncertainty and new challenges."

Most Valuable Lesson Learned?

"I think Dory in Finding Nemo had it right – just keep swimming! It isn’t always the fastest or strongest who finishes the race. Many times it is the one who has the most endurance to keep on learning, encouraging others along the way, and finding purpose in action. When I was a new manager, I had a bunch of missteps in my first few months – as many new managers do! But one thing my mentor encouraged me to do was to keep trying – because someday I was going to be a great people manager. How? By not giving up. By taking each scenario and reviewing my response, then continuing to improve and refine so that the next time faced with the same scenario, I would be a better equipped to respond. It was a valuable lesson I still continue to practice to this day."

Personal Mantra

"Alis Volat Propriis – which translates to 'She flies with her own wings'."

Honored byNewsweekas one of the “Women Shaping the 21st Century,” TiffanyShlain is an Emmy-nominated filmmaker, author, founder of The Webby Awards, and co-founder of two global initiatives, Character Day and 50/50 Day--unified days of film and discussion about important issues shaping our lives that unite over 100,000 live events. Character Day explores the science of character and 50/50 Day focuses on gender equity. Selected by the Albert Einstein Foundation as a contributor toGenius: 100 Visions of the Future, Tiffany's films and work have received over 80 awards and distinctions including premieres at The Sundance Film Festival and being selected by The US State Department to use her films to represent America around the world and have received over 50 million views. She serves on the Leadership Board of The Center on Media and Child Health at Harvard's Boston Children's Hospital and she is a Henry Crown Fellow of The Aspen Institute. She is currently writing a book about her family’s decade long ritual of turning off screens one day each week for what they call their Technology Shabbats. The book will be published by Simon & Schuster in 2019. Learn more about Tiffany at www.tiffanyshlain.com and follow her@tiffanyshlain!

Please join us on November 15 to celebrate our Make Your Mark Award winners, and hear Tiffany share powerful stories and insights on advancing women in positions of leadership. RSVP TODAY!

Join us for our annual event, the Make Your Mark Awards! Enjoy old friends, make new ones and be inspired by the incredible women - and men - who make up the Watermark community. Let's celebrate these leaders who are driving change for women within their companies or organizations, and beyond! RSVP today to purchase your seat and your VIP Reception ticket.

Congratulations to the winners of this year's Make Your Mark Awards! And thank you for all the nominees submitted for consideration.

Connection: Brandi Galvin Morandi, Chief Legal Officer at Equinix

Development: Ana Gabriela Pinczuk, former President and General Manager at HPE

Advocacy: René Shimada Siegel, CEO and Founder at Connext

Impact: Women Who Code, accepted by Alaina Percival, CEO at Women Who Code

Over the next couple weeks, we are excited to share more about each of these special winners and their contributions to women in leadership! Subscribe to the Watermark blog to receive notifications about new posts. We look forward to celebrating with you in November.

If you are interested in sponsorship and/or table pricing, please contact Kate Byrne.